By Liz Pidgeon
On
25 July 2008 the Australian
Newspapers Beta service at
http://ndpbeta.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/home
launched with 70,000 out of copyright newspaper pages from 1803 onwards.
Since then a change of name has taken place and the site is commonly referred to
as TROVE. Additional pages are to be added each week.
The service, an initiative of the National Library of Australia, in
collaboration the Australian State and Territory libraries, currently includes
incomplete runs from:
The Argus, daily, Melbourne, 1915-19 and 1945 available
The Canberra Times, 1926-1929
The Courier-Mail, daily, Brisbane, 1933-34
Perth Gazette and Western Australian journal, daily, 1833-1847
The Mercury, daily, Hobart, 1916-1917
The Maitland mercury, and Hunter River general advertiser, New South Wales,
1843-1855 and 1880-1883
The South Australian advertiser, a daily newspaper, 1858-1861
The Sydney Gazette, the first newspaper in Australia, 1803-1815.
Not all search results are currently viewable, (these will be coloured pink) but there is a note on these that they can be accessible shortly. The site uses electronically translated text and as such there are many errors. There is a facility for individuals to correct text, which will make it easier to search. Explore the different ways of searching, including the option to search all papers. For family history research include your name and place, this is particularly useful if you have a common name, and when looking for death notices for example.
Spending time reading the Help link will also explain the best way to get the most out of your searching.
This
is an excellent website to add to the growing resources online available for
Australian researchers. For Victorian research the following are also useful:
Argus Index 1870 - 1879 http://www.nla.gov.au/argus/
Paper
of Record http://www.paperofrecord.com/default.asp
(pay for view website) which includes the Port Phillip Record 1840 - 1902
and The
Ryerson Index http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~nswsdps/dpsindex.htm
for more contemporary death and funeral notices in Australian newspapers.
If
you register as a remote user with the State Library of Victoria you can access
the Times Digital Archive via the link
http://www.slv.vic.gov.au/catalogues/information_databases/offsite.html.
This is complete content of the London Times to 1985 fully searchable with
viewable images.
Do not forget that we are lucky to have two historical newspapers for Kilmore and area. The Kilmore Advertiser and Kilmore Free Press, which are both available on microfilm at our Resource Centre. These can also be accessed in person at the State Library of Victoria. For details on the years covered etc visit the Resources page on our website at www.kilmorehistory.info.
Newspapers are a valuable resource for our local and family history. Happy hunting!
- Kilmore Connections (newsletter of the Kilmore Historical Society) September 2008
Kilmore Historical Society Page Updated 12 April, 2011